


passenger side

by crickets



Category: The Killing
Genre: F/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-19
Updated: 2012-06-19
Packaged: 2017-11-08 02:30:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/438153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crickets/pseuds/crickets





	passenger side

  


Stephen can't even look at her.

 _After_.

Thing is, he didn't even think. It was all gut. All instinct.

He sits with her in the dark and he closes his eyes and he tries to remember the moment his finger squeezed the trigger, but the memories don't come. He only remembers Wright, on the floor, fucking dead as anything ever has the right to be, and Sarah, to his left, her hand reaching out, color in her cheeks,... alive.

 _Alive_.

-

Sarah can't even look at him.

 _After_.

The thing is? She was ready to die. I mean, it's not like she's got a death wish. But in that moment? The fear went straight down her spine and out through her stomach and she thought... _this is it_. But it wasn't. Because Stephen was next to her and he did what she needed him to do and what Richmond could never do and he put poor Jamie Wright out of his misery.

She sits with him in the dark and she takes in a breath and she tries not to remember the moment that the glass shattered. But she can't force it back so it just plays over and over again in her mind until she makes herself think of something else, anything else. So she thinks of the moment after, Stephen with his gun still at the ready and his eyes glassed over and the way he shivered when she touched him, his adrenaline pulsing with fear and life.

 _Life_.

-

He follows her down the hall, stands in the doorway while she watches Rosie on the screen.

But Holder's not watching Rosie. He's watching _her_ , the light flickering across her face along with the subtle shift in her expression the moment she says goodbye, the moment she finally lets go. Not of everything, though. But of Rosie and the Larsens and the conspiracy that's haunted the two of them all these weeks. (Seems like years. Centuries, even.) She _does_ let go of that.

At least this time.

For a little while. 

-

She asks him to drive her to the Larsens.

_She doesn't smoke his cigarettes._

He's next to her, staring up at the building, and the phone rings and she swallows hard.

This, as it turns out, really is it. 

_He doesn't ask her to stay._

\- 

The thing is, he _wants_ to ask her come with him. 

Because... he doesn't really know how to do this without her.

But she's so fragile now. She's this delicate thing who's decided for once in all this mess to put herself first, and he knows he wouldn't need a bulldozer or a pistol to knock her down. Just a word, just a whisper. 

_Stay_. 

So instead, he says something about catching bad guys, and Sarah smiles.

He remembers that. 

It takes everything in him to be able to drive away and just leave her there outside the Larsens, but that's exactly what she needs him to do. Exactly the thing that's the hardest. She needs it, and it's his job now to protect her. To make sure she's better.

 _Or maybe it's the other way around?_

\- 

Sarah doesn't really know what to do with herself those first few days. 

She rents an apartment and calls Jack a lot and looks for a job that doesn't involve dead people, and on one such day she finds herself driving to the station. 

_Just out of habit._

She watches Holder walk to his car. He smokes a cigarette, paces once or twice before he kicks the driver's side tire. She almost gets out, almost goes to him. His first kill, no partner, and he's all alone. And it doesn't help that she's got this guilt that weighs heavy on her chest. Like she's the one that made this happen.

 _Like she's the one responsible._

He flips open his phone, punches in a number, and Sarah nearly jumps when her phone rings.

Later, she listens to the message:

"Yo Linden, how you doing, girl? Just wanted to call. Check up on you. Make sure you're eating your vegetables and all," he laughs then, and it kills her because she remembers the look on his face from across the parking lot. The smile quickly fading to something more like desperation. "Hey listen, your stuff's still at my place. You know, I wouldn't mind, it's just the _ladies..._ " he trails off. "Nah," he sighs. "You got me. I just was hoping to see you is all. Call me, alright? Later." 

-

A week goes by and he's only seen her once. 

The first time, she stops by the station. She brings him some coffee and a maple bacon donut and tells him she's just there to fill out some final paperwork with Carlson. She sits down in his office, _their office_ , and he tells her she looks like she's doing good, looks like she's eating, but just as he's about to ask her about Jack, two of the guys interrupt them with some updates on the new case and he can tell by the look on her face that she can't stay.

"Hey Linden, where you going? We're not done talking!" he shouts after her, down the hall. 

She spins on her heel for a moment, "Carlson," she explains, "I'll see you before I leave." 

Then she turns back and gets lost in the crowd, and she never does come back to see him that day.

_Never does._

\- 

Sarah drives a lot. 

She's got no where to go really, but she drives anyway.

There are times when she turns to the passenger side to tell him something that comes to mind, or maybe something she saw on the side of the road, or even just to tease him.

_But then she remembers he's not there._

It's his voice in her head, _always_. "You're still my ride, Linden."

She rolls her eyes, keeps driving. 

-

The next time he sees her, she stops by to pick up her things. She wears her hair down and smiles way too much, and he cooks her food and they talk about everything 'cept Little Man, everything 'cept Rosie Larsen.

He also doesn't tell her how, two days in, Carlson sent him home because he kept seeing fucking Jamie Wright's face every time he turned around and it messed him up so bad he couldn't sleep, and how they had to march him down to the shrink a coupla times. He doesn't talk about that at all, but Sarah looks him in the eye and says, "How you holding up?" And she touches his arm and he nearly flinches because she's not the touching type and because it's like she knows exactly what he's thinking. 

"Hey," she says, her voice soft, forgiving, weighty.

He almost tells her it's nothing. _He's fine_. But can't bring himself to lie that big, not to her. So he just says, "I'll be alright. Eventually."

They watch TV and Sarah tells him about her new place and she even lets him talk about his latest case. 

"Cut and dry," she says. 

"Yup," Stephen nods, and for some reason this makes him blush. He can't figure out why. 

"Must be nice," she takes a drink from her wine glass, and leans back against the arm of the couch, letting her legs stretch out and rest in his lap. 

-

He doesn't kiss her this time. 

_He doesn't._

But when he bends down to hug her and her shampoo smells like apples and she just folds into him like she's not even there, like she's a part of him, he thinks, _not this time._

But maybe next time.

_Maybe._

_-fin_


End file.
